Lotus Land's vibrant restaurant scene seduces

Meeru Dhalwala is the owner of Vij's restaurant in the South Granville area of Vancouver.

Photograph by: Stuart Davis
, CNS files

Olympic athletes should be careful in Vancouver. For years, the rest of Canada referred to the city as Lotus Land, a nickname born of both envy and mockery. It alluded to Odysseus’s encounter with the Lotus Eaters, named for their somewhat lazy and dreamy state from the plant they ate.

While it’s very possible that one of our countless Indian, Chinese or Japanese restaurants might serve a dish with lotus root, it won’t put you in a state of narcosis.

My warning to athletes has more to do with eating in this city — like the song of the sirens in The Odyssey, the vibrant restaurant scene will seduce you, lure you and possibly take you off course from your Olympic mission in Vancouver.

I’m just saying, it could cause you to lose focus.

You might think it a shame to travel halfway around the world and not visit Vij’s, which has been called the best Indian restaurant in North America, or Tojo’s (right up there in the pantheon of fabulous Japanese restaurants) or partake of the best Chinese food outside of China. By then, you’ll have discovered there is no end to fabulous eating in Vancouver and there’ll be no stopping you.

To our own surprise and thanks to the Type-A chefs in our midst and passionate local food producers, Vancouver has become one of the world’s go-to food cities. It pleased us to no end when Michelin-star-studded chefs like Daniel Boulud and Jean-Georges Vongerichten of New York deemed Vancouver worthy of their time and talent. Typically Canadian, we needed the confirmation that, hey, we’re hot.

By the time 2010 rolls around, we’ll have these two international luminaries from New York, the culinary equivalent of Olympic athletes, running three kitchens — Daniel Boulud at Lumiere and DB Bistro Moderne and Jean Georges Vongerichten at Market at Shangri-La Hotel.

Boulud says he views the city as a cross between Seattle and San Francisco with the Okanagan wine country nearby. He loves the diverse culture and foods, the “amazing community of chefs”, and was surprised by the density of great restaurants for the size of the city.

Vongerichten is wowed by the amazing products here.

“It’s a very special city with the Asian influences and that’s a big part of my cooking,” he said in an interview last fall. “Good food today is about amazing product, which you have there, and seafood is right there on the Pacific.”

One might think “seafood” in describing our West Coast cuisine. Yes, that’s part of it, but I think our culinary leaders have made regional products the mark of West Coast cuisine, with an emphasis on sustainable ingredients; in turn, we have an admirable network of suppliers and growers and producers. That, in my opinion, is the basis of modern West Coast cuisine.

We have exquisite showcases of regional cuisine at West, C, Raincity Grill, Fuel, Chow, Gastropod and Boneta. And if your stomach is operating on another time zone anyway, you can catch early-bird deals at some high-end restaurants like West and Chow.

One of the more remarkable examples of the focus on local food is the 100-Mile Menu at Raincity Grill, a fabulous three-course tasting menu option in which all of the ingredients are sourced from within 100 miles of the restaurant. The restaurant defies the statistic that a typical North American meal uses ingredients from six countries that have travelled 5,364 kilometres, and shows what can be done. And many local restaurants are part of the Ocean Wise program, where sustainable seafood choices are indicated on their menus and some serve nothing but sustainable species.

Another perk for foodies is the cost of dining. Compared with other major cities in the world, you get great value at most restaurants and nowhere more than at our rich collection of ethnic restaurants. The city reverberates with its mix of cultures, and restaurants are the portals into those cultures — Chinese, Japanese, Vietnamese, Thai, Korean, Indonesian, Malaysian, Indian, Ethiopian, Moroccan, Caribbean, Eastern European, Latin American, Portuguese, Spanish, Greek, Middle Eastern.

I’ve been told there are more sushi restaurants in Vancouver than in Tokyo and from what I saw of Tokyo, I believe it. We’re total addicts and everyone, short of nursing babies, eats sushi here. Not all sushi joint owners or chefs, however, are Japanese. In the last couple of years, the izakaya has been competing for some of the market. The pub-style Japanese fare has taken on a life of its own here. Hapa Izakaya and Kingyo best demonstrate the feel of a Vancouver izakaya and score high on the hipster meter.

And, of course, the Chinese food here is unparalleled in North America. The best, you should know, is not to be found in Vancouver’s Chinatown. In fact, Richmond is the new Chinatown. You can be assured visitors following the Olympic Games in Richmond will not be on the hinterland of good food. It is a city obsessed with food and there are daily traffic snarls as people vie for parking spaces at restaurant-lined malls and streets. Richmond is a dense network of Chinese and other Asian restaurants, from the hole-in-the wall with a magic-fingered noodlemaker creating ribbons of noodles from a lump of dough to high-end wizardry in restaurants such as Sun Sui Wah, Sea Harbour, Gingeri, Northern Delicacy, Shiang Garden and Shanghai River.

In many ways, as a city, we’re learning from the various cultures how to love food — especially the Chinese culture, where their “Hello” greeting is “Have you eaten yet?”

The city’s gained a new designer collection of comfortable French and Italian bistros, like La Quercia, La Buca, Jules, La Brasserie on Davie, and Pied-a-Terre. They’re cozy and intimate and they feel like a slice out of France and Italy, giving nurture and comfort.

At the other busy Olympic venue, Whistler, my long-time favourite restaurant is Araxi, but fickle me, I’d be just as happy at Fifty-two 80 Bistro at the Four Seasons Hotel or Bearfoot Bistro (starring chef Melissa Craig, who won a coveted top chef spot in a national cooking competition in 2008).

Tucked away on a quieter street, Apres offers an intimate dining experience, away from madding crowds. And when in Whistler, I breakfast at Ciao Thyme Bistro where you get a great breakfast and a wakey-wakey atmosphere, thanks to the classic rock music.

Those who might be travelling to Cypress Mountain for events will find themselves in West Vancouver. One of the most expensive postal codes in Canada this small community is sandwiched between mountains and the sea and you’ll find some of the best view restaurants are located here (Fraiche and Beach House at Dundarave have both food and view going for it) and it’s also home to my favourite French bistro, La Regalade, where you would take big appetites for big atmosphere and delicious food.

To my way of thinking, a good welcome should include food and, from that perspective, I think Vancouver’s more than ready to host the Olympics.

Meeru Dhalwala is the owner of Vij's restaurant in the South Granville area of Vancouver.

Photograph by: Stuart Davis, CNS files

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